Can Carlos Alcaraz challenge the records of tennis greats?

The Big Three of men’s tennis—Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic—dominated the game for most of the first decade of the 21st century. None of them had won more than 14 men’s Grand Slam titles before they went on to win 20, 22 and 24, respectively. They have created so many records and so much history that it’s a wonder they left none of it to anyone else.

Carlos Alcaraz, however, has already achieved another feat. After winning the 2022 US Open – the youngest player to do so in 32 years – he became the youngest player ever to hold the ATP No. 1 ranking, at just 19 years and four months. He went on to win another Grand Slam, and another, and another.

His French Open win in June made him the youngest man to win a Grand Slam on all three surfaces (hard, grass and clay). When he won his second Wimbledon title a month later, it made him the youngest man in the Open era to win a “Chanel Slam” (the French Open and Wimbledon in the same year). If he wins either the 2025 US Open or the 2025 Australian Open, he will become the first person to win five Grand Slam titles before his 22nd birthday. (Winning the Australian Open would also make him the youngest person to win a Grand Slam in his career.)

The Big Three have tarnished history, but Alcaraz is capitalizing on it anyway. It’s impossible to look at his achievements so far without starting to picture his path to 20-plus Grand Slam titles. But before Federer, Nadal and Djokovic, such accomplishments were unthinkable. Most of them have aged and fallen out of contention: Federer has retired, Nadal looks set to retire soon, and while Djokovic is still going strong, he is 37 and in the midst of his weakest season in years. (Though Djokovic’s “least accomplished” still includes a Grand Slam final and an Olympic gold medal.)

Alcaraz appears to be the standard-bearer for the sport’s future. Which is fitting, given that his style of play combines Djokovic’s speed and flexibility, Nadal’s passion and Federer’s skillful fielding.

But what can actually be accomplished—and what can we reasonably expect—in a post-Big Three world? And what is stopping Alcaraz from making history?

Injuries and cautionary tales

It’s only been three years since Alcaraz made his first major breakthrough, reaching the quarterfinals of the 2021 US Open at the age of 18. He won all four Grand Slams that year, which is already a testament to his prowess on all five courts and tournaments. A year later, he survived five epic sets against former US Open champion Marin Cilic and American Frances Tiafoe and beat Casper Ruud in the final to win the No. 1 tournament.

In the years since, Alcaraz’s body has betrayed him on and off. He missed the 2023 Australian Open with a hamstring injury; then, after splitting two sets with Djokovic in the French Open semifinals, he suffered from full-body cramps and quickly lost the final two sets. Then he beat Djokovic in a stunning 2023 Wimbledon final, overcoming a forearm injury to win the French Open and Wimbledon this summer. When it comes to Alcaraz’s attempts to rack up a career-high Grand Slam total, his body may be his biggest enemy. His physical, muscular style of play seems to push the boundaries at all times, and occasionally he breaks down. (Of course, Nadal has also pushed the boundaries, broken down, and still found time to win 22 Grand Slams.)

But if we look at other successful young players, there is another hurdle that Alcaraz has to overcome. As impressive as the big three were in terms of talent and adaptability, they were also outliers when it came to their ability to last. successOthers who saw success at Alcaraz’s level at Alcaraz’s age were unable to continue it.

Besides Alcaraz, four other players have won four Grand Slam titles before the age of 22: Ken Rosewall, Bjorn Borg, Mats Wilander and Boris Becker.

In fact, Rosewall’s story doesn’t apply to this situation – he was a product of the pre-Open era of the 1950s, and probably would have won 16 to 20 Grand Slam titles had he not had to choose between winning majors and making real money – but the other three share some similarities.

Borg was unlike anything the tour had ever seen when he burst onto the scene at the age of 18. He won his first French Open in 1974, repeated it in 1975, and then won Wimbledon in 1976 and 1977. He had four Grand Slam titles just a month after his 21st birthday, then won the French Open and Wimbledon every year from 1978 to 1980. He won his sixth French Open in 1981, but his motivation quickly waned. The tour began trying to enforce minimum entry requirements just as Borg began to want to play fewer tournaments. He lost in the 1981 US Open final and never played another Grand Slam. He announced his retirement at the age of 26, and while he began a lukewarm comeback in 1991, he never won another match on the tour.

With Borg gone, another Swede, Wilander, took his place. He won the French Open in 1982 at the age of 17, beating four of the top five players in the process. He also won the Australian Open in 1983 and 1984, then beat John McEnroe and Ivan Lendl to win the French Open in 1985, his fourth Grand Slam, two months before his 21st birthday. His form at his best was extraordinary, but it was not consistent enough to reach the top of the ATP rankings until 1988, when he rode his reworked serve to win three Grand Slam titles in a single year. He won his seventh Grand Slam a month after his 24th birthday, but he never reached another Grand Slam final. Once again, his motivation quickly faded, and he was consistently unable to maintain his high level of play.

Becker was another Wilander, making his first major breakthrough at the age of 17. He used a powerful serve and aggressive game to win a stunning Wimbledon title in 1985. He defended his title in 1986, and after two erratic seasons, he won the last two Grand Slams in 1989, winning Wimbledon and his first US Open. He won the Australian Open in 1991 to claim his fifth Grand Slam title at the age of 23, and was good enough to reach the No. 1 ranking for a few weeks in 1991, but he reached only two more Grand Slam finals after his 24th birthday.

But we have no reason to question Alcaraz’s motives—the tears that followed his Olympic final loss to Djokovic, plus his mini-meltdown in Cincinnati, certainly give the impression that he cares as much as he did before—but if nothing else, the tales of Borg, Wilander and Becker serve as reminders that this story is just beginning.

In all, 13 men have won at least four major titles by their 23rd birthday, and only four of them (Nadal, Pete Sampras, Borg and Rosewall) have more than seven. Using the Big Three as examples may help Alcaraz when it comes to pursuing long-term goals, but he is still in the early stages of his quest to achieve them.

Growth opportunities

Beyond the extraordinary levels of motivation, perhaps the greatest collective trait of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic is their ability to adapt. No one can match Djokovic in this regard, but all three have managed to adjust their game and return to the top of the group.

Perhaps the scariest thing about Alcaraz is that despite his accomplishments, he still has clear room for improvement. He takes unnecessary risks at times, which is fun to watch, but it also costs him points and makes some combinations more difficult.

Although his forehand is extremely powerful and his return technique is among the best in the world, he is more prone to backhand slices than any of his current main rivals. According to match data from Tennis Abstract, he has hit 18% of his backhand slices over the past year, compared with 16% for Djokovic and just 7% for world No. 1 Jannik Sinner. He is perhaps the least effective backhander of all players.

Meanwhile, his serve is just good, not great. Here’s where he ranks in the top 50 of the ATP rankings over the past year in key serving metrics:

— Thirteenth place in the number of points obtained in service (67.6%)

— 14th in number of service games won (85.8%)

— 28th in break points saved (63.6%)

— 34th in first serve points (72.8%)

— 45th in Ace Rate (5.9%)

Alcaraz’s serve numbers are largely comparable to Djokovic’s when he was 21 — Djokovic won 73.7% of his first-serve points and 67.7% of his all-time serve points and held 86.8% of the time in 2008 — but part of Djokovic’s transformation into greatest-of-all-time status has been his massive upgrade in that department.

While Alcaraz is as good as anyone on the long tour, he still wins only 52 percent of short-range points (1-3 shots), compared to 53 percent for Sinner and 55 percent for Djokovic. Those differences don’t sound like much, but every percentage point adds up in this sport, and a few extra big serves and easy points can turn an elite player into an all-time great.

US Open Tennis Championships 2024 and Beyond

Nadal (3), Djokovic (1) and Federer (0) had four Grand Slam titles by the time they reached the US Open at the age of 21. Alcaraz had won four on his own. And while he didn’t have to fend off the Big Three (plus Andy Murray, if you prefer to call it the Big Four), he still had to contend with a still-energetic Djokovic, an older generation of Grand Slam champions (Daniil Medvedev) and finalists (Alexander Zverev, Ruud, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Matteo Berrettini) and a rising crop of younger stars that included not only Sinner – who enjoyed a massive breakthrough in form in early 2024 – but also six other players under the age of 23 who have climbed into the top 25. He has reached at least the semi-finals at six of the past seven Grand Slams, going 4-2 in the semi-finals and 4-0 in the final. In total, he has won 42 of his last 45 Grand Slam matches.

The success of the Big Three has ensured that surpassing their achievements is more like a marathon than a sprint, and the fatigue experienced by young stars of the past who have achieved as much as Alcaraz reminds us that Alcaraz’s race is still in its early stages. But he has achieved historic feats nonetheless, and his trajectory will determine how far we can recalibrate our expectations after the Big Three era.

For the third time in a row, Alcaraz and Sinner have been drawn in the same group at the US Open, meaning either of them faces the prospect of having to beat their young main rival in the semi-finals and Djokovic in the final. Three-time US Open finalist Daniil Medvedev, who beat Alcaraz in the semi-finals last year, is the favourite to win the tournament. also On the Alcaraz-Siner side of the draw, as at Wimbledon, Djokovic has racked up several wins here, perhaps enough to make him the favorite to win.

However, we have reached the point where losing to Alcaraz, especially in the big matches, is shocking. He has withstood the pressure, beaten Djokovic on numerous occasions, and has become a shining light for the sport in the future. The journey may only be beginning, but it looks like it will be a very enjoyable one.